


Cat in the Crow's Nest

by orphan_account



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gang AU, M/M, Roommates, adding more tags as they apply, bodyguard Nishinoya, collab piece, mob brain Kenma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-13
Updated: 2014-10-13
Packaged: 2018-02-21 02:40:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2451671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Karasuno gang runs a pretty smooth operation. Better known as the Crows, they're one of the top running gangs in the country, along with Nekoma and Aoba Jousai. And thanks to a particularly sticky deal, they're running a little short in manpower. Enter, one pint-sized body guard and a particularly cat-like brain. </p><p>"My roommate's probably not a freak, right? Statistically speaking, they're probably a normal person."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cat in the Crow's Nest

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so this is a collab I've been working on with tumblr user kenxshou- they're super great and you should go follow them because this whole thing was their idea. I'm writing Noya and they've got Kenma. We've got a bunch plotted out for this so look forwards to fairly consistent updates! 
> 
> So here's our roommate/gang AU

_I want to live forever and if I could live forever everything would come true_  
 _But everything I have keeps driving me_  
 _During the time I have left to live where can I find my dreams?_  
  
Listening to the lyrics of the song Kenma bobbed his head softly forward and back rhythmically, while his gaze followed the rushing street that past in a single moment. The taxi was warm and he felt comfortable sitting in the warm vehicle, legs crossed, listening to music while waiting for the driver to reach the destination: his new apartment, the one that he had to share with someone. From that apartment on he would proceed with his work. A sigh left his lips while the chorus echoed in his head. Somehow this song didn’t manage to cheer him up nor to distract him properly. He changed the music and heard the reassuring guitar riffs of “Thousand enemies” before leaning back into the car seat again. He didn’t even understand how he was forced to take this job. He could hear Kuroo’s voice in his head resounding as he clicked his tongue. By now the driver must’ve thought anything of the half blond. Whatever. He still had first to get to the new apartment. How to deal with his new flatmate? Well, he’d try to figure that out some other time- the travel from Tokyo to Miyagi was already stressful enough.  
  
Within about 20 Minutes he had reached the apartment complex, getting out of the car and paying the driver. His luggage was unloaded and he looked up the rather tall building. Well this would be an adventure. Not that he hadn’t been outside of Tokyo before; that wasn’t the case. It was since his childhood the very first time Kenma Kozume ever lived with anyone else but his best friend Tetsurou Kuroo. Kenma was a very special human and until now only the blackhaired best friend managed to handle his antics, so of course suddenly moving because of a transfer job and living with someone for longer than about a month was a very big issue for him. But he could dwell over the disaster some other time. Right now he had to get to this new apartment and hope he was the first to arrive. Because as far as he understood it his flatmate would be new to this area as well. Maybe if he was the first he could seem dominant and establish some rules. He had to see that.  
   
Taking his two suitcases with him he was very happy to see an elevator and hit the button to call for it. At least he didn’t have to worry about getting those suitcases up into the 5th floor by himself. The elevator itself was very small and old. It sure didn’t leave a good impression on the cat. Anyway, he had to get into the fifth floor now. Pressing the button, he waited to reach his destination. It felt like about five ages. The door to the apartment was a solid normal brown wood door- nothing fancy, nothing extraordinary. It was just a fucking door. Well, Kenma had expected at least a bit more decoration, but somehow he was glad that that it wasn’t the case. He took the key he had been given about a week ago for the new apartment and entered it only to see that his boxes with stuff had been already there together, left with a note. It read: “Taketora and I got your stuff here, have fun with your new Roommate, Kenma! Also, Kuroo put together the box with ‘NEST’ written on it. Love, Yaku.” He exhaled, looking for the box from Kuroo. He opened it and saw his beloved pillows and blankets in there- he gave a shaking exhale once again.  
  
“Oh thank god,” He murmured and sighed. It was all freshly washed; he could tell from the nice scent. It seemed as if Kuroo had been careful to leave it fluffy, just to Kenmas liking. The cat pulled out one of the blankets and inhaled the fresh scent. Just now the extreme tiredness of his mind and body hit him like a wrecking ball. He was tired. He needed sleep. Just for a little while, he thought to himself, taking everything out of the box and constructing his little nest in the middle of the room. Just a nap for an hour or so. Just an hour, he told himself, snuggling into the pile of blankets and pillows on the floor. This was almost like back in Tokyo. The only thing that was missing was Kuroo in the kitchen making apple pie to please the cat. Laying there in the comfortable nest Kenma yawned, thinking back to the day when he announced his transfer work.  
  
“Huh? A transfer Job?” Kuroo sighed and scratched the back of his neck while looking at his best friend, who was sitting at his laptop still typing something. “Yeah. Aparently the Crows have a problem. Half of their people are out on missions so they need some back up from us.” Kenma seemed unimpressed.  
  
“So your first thought it to send me? You know nothing here works without me, Kuroo.” The blackhaired man stayed silent and Kenma actually stopped typing for a moment.  
  
“I know, but they need some backup, Kenma.” The blond pushed the laptop of his lap and onto the floor. 

“It’s that urgent?”

Kuroo nodded. If it was like that, then he had to follow suit if he wanted or not.

“So what exactly should we do now?”

“You’re transferring to Miyagi where the Crows main station is and help them there with their work until Sawamura and the rest return. It’s unsure, though, when they will. Yaku and I will look after the work over here. Can you manage it, Kenma?” The blond shrugged.

“Dunno,” He said in all honesty and looked at his laptop.  
   
Basically that was their talk about this. Kenma had adapted with the situation rather fast and had no problem with packing his stuff and preparing to depart, until suddenly the realization hit him. From now on he would live together with someone else than Kuroo. In another, place completely unfamiliar to him. With someone he didn’t know, someone who might not even belong to the crows. He would be all on his own for several months. But there had been no going back anyway. And now he was here, trying to fall asleep. But somehow it didn’t feel right. He had his pillows, he had his blankets- right.  
It was way too damn cold to sleep. Getting up after letting out a whine he looked around the apartment for the temperature regulation and put it up so it would soon get warmer. Hell, this was like an ice palace right here, and he really couldn’t stand the cold. With that problem fixed he snuggled back into the blankets. Just a nap. A quick nap before he would take the boxes into one of the bedrooms and- … and-  
  
And he fell asleep. 

\--------  
  
He could probably make an entire house out of the boxes and not both with having a roommate. Every time he forgot where something was, all he had to do was search through a couple of boxes and then he would decide that he didn’t actually need it that badly. Other than a few changes of clothes and his laptop, he didn’t have anything left outside of its cardboard prison. Even his cooking stuff (which although rarely used, was appreciated) was packed away into its little corner under a microwave and a guitar that he had always meant to learn how to play. He’d been living on a steady diet of ramen and instant coffee ever since this whole moving out thing had started. 

  
It wasn’t like travel was new to him. His job required him to go wherever his client went. With his brand of work, that could be anywhere in Japan. One time he’d accompanied a prominent- ahem, businessman- to Venezuela for a particularly opulent job. It’d paid him enough to set him up for a couple of months, which was the only reason he’d agreed to it in the first place. Hopefully, this one would be the same. 

  
Guarding the Karasuno gang’s primary supplier? He was beyond excited for the opportunity to even get into contact with someone like this. He’d held up some bargains with high level people before, but this was on a whole different level of cool. Along with the clothes he had set aside for wearing, Noya had left a pair of intimidating black sunglasses out. All the good body guards wore sunglasses. 

  
The only thing that made him hesitant about this whole gig was the fact that he’d have to get his own housing. Normally he just stayed with the client- all the better to protect them with, right? But with this guy, since it was such a long term job, he was stuck finding himself other accommodations. The worst part was, thanks to his habit of not reading the fine print, he’d lost a lot of cash in an investment with the wrong crowd. He couldn’t afford to get his own apartment in a neighborhood that wouldn’t shoot first ask questions later when they saw him with the crows, and Karasunos weren’t the kind of people he wanted himself indebted to thank you. He’d never met any of them outside of interviews for his position but they all struck him as the slippery kind. They’d con you out of your money as soon as they handed it to you. He’d have to watch himself with these people. 

  
Roommate. He shuddered at the thought. What kind of weirdo would he be stuck with? He hadn’t met the guy in real life, only exchanged emails. He’d suggested phone calls or meeting up once or twice to get to know each other a little bit first, but the guy- Kenma- had refused. Hadn’t given much of an explanation other than a muttered apology, either. What if the guy was a total antisocial freak? Maybe he had lived with his mother all these years and was one of those guys with four computers and a World of Warcraft addiction. He could only handle so many empty bags of potato chips strewn around the apartment, after all. 

  
On the other hand, there was the possibility that he was just shy. Hopefully. Nishinoya didn’t quite understand the whole concept of being shy, and why you wouldn’t just put your best foot forward when meeting someone, but he accepted it. Some people just didn’t like talking on the phone- Asahi was the same way. There was no possibility of this guy being anything like Asahi, from what he could tell. Maybe he had googled him. Just like, really quickly. To figure out a little bit about his mysterious flat mate. 

  
The results were confounding. The only thing that had come up were results about this rich brat from an illustrious family. The kid who came up looked like the kind of kid who bought expensive clothes but always managed to make them look like he just grabbed them from the thrift shop, despite the enormous tags hanging off of them. Plus, he had a bad dye job. Who had a giant inheritance and didn’t even bother to get his roots done? The perpetually bored look on his face was off putting too. That couldn’t be his roommate, he concluded. Who had a multi-million dollar inheritance coming to him and put out a craigslist ad for a shitty apartment? It was just an unfortunate namesake, he thought. 

  
Now where had he put the duct tape? He needed to finish up with the last of the boxes. The movers were coming soon, and he’d already paid for it. If he wasn’t done by then he’d be leaving things he couldn’t afford to behind, and with his already low budget, rebuying them wasn’t an option. Noya pulled it off of the coffee table and went about putting the final touches on the containers. Everything he owned, neatly packaged up and shipped off to a new life. There was a touch of sadness in all of this business. He’d be leaving behind a lot. Despite his profession, he had managed to make a couple of friends over the years and there was a solemn tugging in his heart that reminded him that they were part of the past now.

  
He wished he could seal off this part of his life as neatly as could with the boxes. A layer of duct tape and two closed flaps, and it was shut away until he chose to reopen it. There was no compartmentalizing this part of him. Memories kept welling up, and he struggled to crush them back into their boxes where they belonged. Would he be able to keep up with his friends here? Would they even want to keep up with him? The area- just outside of Tokyo- wasn’t that far away, he reassured himself. He’d be able to come back at some point to visit once he had the funds. This job would pay. Definitely worth it, right? 

  
Introspective quiet was displaced by the blaring honk of a taxi outside. That was his ride, he guessed. The movers were going to have to take care of this mess themselves. Nishinoya his nerves down to some deep part inside of him at the same time he pushed the taxi fare into his pocket. Now wasn’t the time to freak out. He’d already made the decision, and dammit, he was going to follow through with it. Did he want to be the kind of guy who backed out of illegal deals that he probably couldn’t get out of if he wanted to? Well, not that he had much of a choice, but of course not! He’d get the guard the coolest guy in the entire city! 

  
He could be excited for this if he wanted to. 

  
As he made his way down through his apartment complex, he tried to hype himself for this. The driver popped the trunk open, and he threw his bag inside with maybe a little too much force. He was lucky there wasn’t anything expensive in there, or he’d have been regretting that decision for a month. Moving was the kind of thing he just had to deal with in his line of work. Other people moved for their jobs all the time. In fact, he was lucky that he got to stay in the same country. Next time he might be going to America, or maybe somewhere exotic. That’d be super exciting. 

  
“So what’s it that you’re going to?” The taxi driver asked. He didn’t make eye contact, but then, his eyes were on the road. Bad conversationalists made the best drivers, he thought. The man had an odd accent, and although it was obvious that Japanese wasn’t his native language, he was obviously making an attempt at being friendly. Noya was glad for the chance at distraction. Talking to strangers was one of his skills. He wouldn’t describe himself as eloquent or particularly charismatic, but man, could he talk. The coiled tension in his body started to flow out along with the words. 

  
“New apartment. Kinda excited, you know? But I’m leaving a bunch of friends behind, so I don’t know what that’s going to be like.” 

“What are you going to the new housing for?” 

“Work,” he didn’t offer any more information, and thankfully, the driver didn’t inquire. He had a cover story, but he preferred to stick to short answers when it came to that kind of stuff. 

“Do you know of anyone in the new city?” The taxi driver glanced over quickly, making sure that he hadn’t touched on a sensitive topic as he had sensed he had with the previous one. To his relief, the other man gave a wide grin in response. 

“Nope. But that’s part of the exciting bit- getting to know a whole new group of people, making friends? That sounds kinda cheesy, but I can’t wait to meet the people I’m gonna work with. They have a reputation for being pretty interesting. I can’t help but notice your accent, sorry. Where are you from?” 

  
This went on for the duration of the car ride. It was easy small talk about nothing at all that took some of the worry off of the man’s shoulders. He could do this all day. The polite back and forth chatting came naturally to him, and it let him turn off his brain for a little while. Since he wasn’t the type to think before speaking, talking was more a game of call and response. Quick reactions picking up on social cues and playing them back- subconsciously, maybe, but still entertaining all the same. He always felt accomplished after having a long conversation with a complete stranger. 

  
It looked like he’d be making an all new kind of conversation now, though. The taxi pulled up into an unmarked parking space and the driver cut the engine. “This is the address you have given me,” the driver said. He then asked for his frankly ridiculous fare. Crinkling his nose, Nishinoya dished it out, watching sadly as the money he needed passed into the other’s hand. Quickly, he thanked the man and got out of the car to grab his bag. This was it.

  
The apartment looked pretty nice from the outside; it was a russet brick building with plenty of windows and plenty of floors. There were even flower boxes outside some of them, much to his amusement. This did not look like the kind of place a body guard would live. It looked like somewhere that grandmothers and their cats spent the rest of their days. At least, he thought, there were no kids running around. He took that as a good omen. 

  
He shuffled to the door and fumbled with his phone until he figured out how to buzz himself in. His and his roommate’s names were already on the call box. Had the land lords done that, or was his roommate already here? Kozume Kenma, he read off of the plaque. It wouldn’t have been hard for the other to arrive early, considering that from what Nishinoya had understood, he already lived somewhere in the area before this. Was he the kind of guy to go out of his way to be polite? Maybe he was a total neat freak, or had OCD or something. The handwriting on the box was too messy for that, though. Could just be that he had the nicest, most considerate roommate in the whole world. Wouldn’t that be great? Someone who actually picked up after themselves and didn’t eat his food when he left it in the fridge? He’d heard that some people did that, and if this guy did, they’d have a long talk.

  
It’d be just like living with Sugawara. He wasn’t sure he was capable of the moral high ground to do that- he didn’t want to be constantly apologizing for leaving his shit around. To be fair, though, he didn’t want someone like himself either. Maybe a balance of the two. 

  
Maybe he should get his ass up to the room, stop imagining the guy, and actually meet him. Deep breath. He needed to put his best foot forward towards this guy. He wiped his expression, managing to put on his best friendly smile. 

  
One more breath and he pushed the door open. He was confronted with impenetrable darkness- it looked like the shades had been drawn over the windows, and every single light in the whole apartment was off. Maybe he had been wrong and Kenma wasn’t here yet? That seemed likely, considering the fact that the apartment was still pretty orderly, from what he could tell. Unfortunately, that didn’t include the location of the light switch. 

  
Sighing, he shrugged his bag off and dumped it by the door. It was mostly empty, but he didn’t want to risk getting tangled up in it if he walked into an end table or something. Knowing him, that was pretty likely. When it came to his job, his coordination was on point. When it came to every other waking moment, he was about as graceful as an ice skating llama. Not that he’d ever seen one of those, he just imagined that it wasn’t a pretty sight. 

  
When he thought about it later, meeting his roommate because he’d been thinking about the hilarity of ice skating llamas, he’d think that it was an appropriate way to kick things off. Halfway between the entry hall and what he made out in the half-light to be a living area of sorts, his foot came into contact with a small, squishy lump. What the…? It was probably just a pillow or something that the owners had left lying around. Not a particular good thing, but whatever. Easy oversight. 

  
He carefully stepped over what he approximated to be the pillow. 

  
He was wrong. 

  
He went down with a yelp; Nishinoya’s ankle twisted out from under him and sent him spiraling into a disorganized heap of blankets and limbs. “What the fuck?” He hissed, feeling now that the form underneath him wasn’t a pillow- though it was swathed in enough blankets to be one, and he was sure that there were definitely some of them scattered in there. He’d stumbled onto what seemed like a nest of fabric and human. 

  
“What the actual fuck.” It wasn’t a question, the way he said it. Unsteadily, he rose from the pile and groped the wall for a light switch. Luckily, his hand came across one and he flicked it on. Somewhere in his mind it registered that it was god awfully hot in this room and why would you wrap yourself in a blanket- but mostly he was occupied by scowling at the form on the floor. His pleasant smile had dropped at the same moment that he had. Why was there a hobo camped out in his apartment? That was the only legitimate explanation he could think of for this situation. 

  
He crouched down to get a better look at the form, and was greeted by a pair of intense, almost cat-like brown eyes. They were almost the same color as his, maybe with fewer amber lights in them. His similarities ended there. This guy had blond hair that ended along his jawline, though he noticed that the top was a darker color. His eyes were squinted as well, tired and disinterested. Despite that he felt oddly naked as the other took him in. It felt like his eyes were tearing him apart; dissecting him, examining the pieces, and putting him back together all in one moment. He felt scrutinized, but only in a purely scientific way. This kid looked familiar, but he was sure he’d have remembered him if he saw him. 

  
“Look, I don’t know who you are, but you can’t just sleep here.” Sweat was starting form on the back of his neck. Jesus, it was hot. “My roommate’s gonna be here soon, and I don’t want to have some random guy sleeping on the floor when he gets here.” He frowned. The other had stirred somewhat and was staring at him from his cross legged position amongst the blanket pile. Seriously, there was something about that disinterested look that jogged his memory. His roommate. Kozume Kenma. 

  
“Holy shit. Are you—? Oh my fucking god, you’re—I thought you were—oh my fucking god.” 

  
This guy was his roommate. This was the guy that he had seen on the internet, and this was the guy who slept under sixteen blankets when the room was thirty five degrees, and this was the guy who he had just called a hobo. This was the guy he’d been picturing all day as completely different people, but never the one he’d actually seen. Noya had considered a hundred other possibilities, but never that the heir to a giant conglomeration would be renting an apartment with a grungy elevator and what appeared to be non functioning air conditioner.   
He suddenly missed the World of Warcraft Kenma that he had imagined. He was good at people, but how was he going to deal with this?

**Author's Note:**

> Poor Noya. Poor Kenma. 
> 
> Leave comments and kudos and stuff if you like because they make our hearts warm and also makes us feel less like we're talking to ourselves thank


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